AFTERMATH

I suspect my non speaker is having a very hard time when her Ritalin LA wears off. Why is it in the evenings that she goes crazy? Violent, angry, screaming and full of tears and snot? It’s awful. Loud. Traumatic. And the constant hum of anxiety I have becomes a loud roar of helplessness and sadness for her and for us.

It’s not ok that you can say your afternoon was “better” because the screaming didn’t last “as long as the day before.” It’s not great that “at least none of my hair was ripped out today.” No. It’s messed up. And in the aftermath, you can’t see how terrible the storm was. Just like before, you couldn’t predict that there would be a storm.

And man, there are many storms.

This was her in the morning. Just suddenly started working on an Afrikaans body part puzzle and did it perfectly! And because she’s so quiet, you don’t even realise she’s ‘busy’ till you really look at her. But with two other very loud children, it took us all a while to realise.🥰

And a bit later on too.

But that same day, we had over an hour of screaming. She spat out any and all medicine even when we thought she’d calmed down enough. She spat out her sleep medicine. Spat out everything that would calm her and threw things down that she herself would call for, like juice. It was prolonged torture and she ripped my hair and finally got two pieces.

Yesterday also began fine.

I was accompanying her into the car where she likes just sitting sometimes, and she said, “Garses!” so I lent them to her.

But the storm this little work out, just basically doing a squat over a chair, and then a very mild ten minute children’s work out has brought me excruciating pain that made itself felt at 2am when my dear 11 year old girl started bashing around the house and banging her door. It’s 3:35am and I’ve just gone to tell her to stop making noise and sleep. But she’s just made more noise as I type. The pain in my side, my hip, is horrendous. It’s a combo of joint and muscle pain. I’ve taken my pain tablets for muscle pain and will see! As my friend said, it’s not cool that the very thing you’re trying to do to reduce the effect of AS on your body, causes AS to strangle you and cause you so much suffering.

This just looks like a car door. Nobody would know it’s the aftermath of the evening’s screaming attack where she undid her seatbelt when we’d hoped going for a drive would calm her but if not, would save the others from the noise. You don’t see the food she threw down. You don’t hear the screams that drove her siblings away from the area she was in.

You also don’t realise that this laughter in a bedroom is not the norm. They’re usually together in the sitting room. But she’d been screaming too much so they went elsewhere and isolated themselves.

The aftermath is calm and quiet.

You don’t realize that my hair is up on my head so my girl can’t grab it and when it’s hanging down my back and break more of it.

But the trauma and physical pain on all of us of all these conditions combined can’t be erased.

And this trauma reminds me of something I was trying to tell a friend and of a reason why I agreed with another friend that I’m in danger.

There are times the man who pretended to marry me is so cold that I fear for my life. I once thought he’d ram the car into me. He got in with this very cold dark look on his face where he couldn’t hide his hatred. I had asked why he was so cruel and cold that day. He just asked what it had to do with me. Another time was when I asked if he’s still in his ego relationship with his ho. When you’re happy in sin, you don’t like reminders that your actions will come back to you in a whirlwind. You feel attacked instead of prompted to change.

I am truly afraid of him and I have reason to be. He had two weeks of unbridled cruelty unleashed against my two oldest. It was a few years ago. I didn’t even know how to protect the children because I didn’t know when his fury would come out. One time we ate just standing in the kitchen and my oldest son says something really ridiculous and he whacked him HARD on his skull. My son gave this God awful yell and he screamed that he couldn’t see. He couldn’t see. I’m still traumatised. His vision was distorted for a whole day after that. I was so scared he’d never be ok.

Another time, he took them to the garage and whipped them with a chain. I was keeping the others away and he was talking like a robots the robot he looks like when it’s like he’s contemplating smashing into me as I stand in front of the car. “You must respect me. Who..do..you..think..you..are?”

And that’s been a cry he’s aimed at me for years now. In 2016 when I asked what he thought his God would have done with him if he’d died in his cheating, he told me I was being disrespectful. Another time, I asked if he didn’t see the irony of how if he’d died, people would have claimed he’s such a food family man yet a stranger would have known he’s not at all family oriented. He again accused me of being disrespectful. I asked him how long this stupid relationship would have gone on for. He told me he had no reason to be interrogated by me.

And so, when out of the blue he suddenly attacked our first daughter, causing her to fall together with a wooden chair, bursting a blood vessel in her eye, I was as shocked as she was. He had never been violent before. It was the most painful thing to hear people asking my child what happened to her eye.

Each time, I told him he had damaged my children. This was how he was raised by his mommy who he worships. All his siblings and he himself attest to how cruel she was. He’s told me multiple times of the weapons she used on them. I heard her myself beating her 19 year old (The one she had with her married lover. It runs in the family. Evil and adultery. All of them. Father included) when I lived with them in the UK. And then she’s surprised she had to call the police once when he then grabbed her by the neck to stop her?

Yet hey, he told me I’m a bad mother. “You should be like my mother instead of laughing with them so much.”

Says a lot about what bothers him. Our happiness. And someone who hates you being happy is someone who hates you.

The aftermath of abusing your daughter, son and wife, is a daughter who bears trauma and is determined to never allow herself to live a fake life. I guess this is why she makes herself so available to other hurting girls. Girls who say she’s the only reason they haven’t killed themselves. Girls whose parents are just as cruel as her father.

And so, when a man who said he admires my husband wrote to ask me to meet with him, his wife and others and the father of my children, I refused. I was mistreated last time that happened. By both husband and him and another elder. All of them demanding that I act unhurt and as if I’m loved.

Nope. The aftermath of their furthered abuse is a stronger woman who bows to no man who isn’t a man indeed.

But that places me in danger. He never again did act violent. But a man who can give tens of thousands to a ho has no morals nor integrity and is capable of anything. Anything to free him to enjoy someone who doesn’t expect him to be anything with standards but just a sugar daddy.

The wounds on my heart are invisible. The pain mommy body makes my daughter ask how I can smile when underneath my skin is torture. The same reason I smile despite being trapped with a cruel man who never had any intention of ever keeping his vows. Why propose when you don’t propose to be a husband? Why not just live as an immoral bachelor?

It’s 4:08am and the pain is reduced a bit.

So, I end with the few light moments of yesterday. I had a few.

Ms Naynay was telling her ten year old brother about how she’s almost finished her current grade which she began six months ago(!) and is “going to start a NEW grade! Look, here are my books! Here’s my Maths! It’s so exciting!”🥰🥰🥰

It’s her still telling me often that she loves school and is so thankful I’m teaching her “all these things.”

You can’t see clearly but those little bits of light are something she got out of bed to come get me out of bed for last night. “You need to come see something!” Ok, ma’am!

Their planet floor puzzle glows in the dark.

It’s in how this one RUNS to the TV when certain songs play. This is a sensory delight for her!

It’s also in how my Amarissa made sure to cement what I said to the psychologist who will be assessing her about her low cognitive and basically ALL abilities are at a much younger age so she relates very well to her six year old sister.

She took her tablet for her session so she could show the psychologist a photo of her sister. I knew it would make a definite impact given how I’d emphasized their bond.

It’s in how my first born is worried that his very long day at uni today will mean I’m alone with a little sister who is going crazy and is wondering if he can do that class online at home so he can help me out with his little sister.🥹

How did I get such thoughtful children who have so much love to give in their very different ways?

I hope so hard, that I’ll be able to protect them from as much damage as I can.

(Can’t edit. It takes a lot to try be happy when your pain isn’t going and the day is coming but you’ve not slept well in way too long. Excuse the typos!)